Art scene hopes to maintain momentum

Brent Knipper, playing Leo Bloom, breaks into the musical number “I want to be a producer” during Muncie Civic Theatres rendition of “The Producers”. The show ran from Feb. 12 to Feb. 27.(Photo: Corey Ohlenkamp / The Star Press)Buy Photo

MUNCIE – Stage performances have been an integral form of entertainment for years, and Muncie is no exception. At the height of the 1950s and ‘60s, Muncie was a prime spot for arts and entertainment. That landscape changed along with the economy.

“The whole environment has changed because the community has changed,” said Robert Myers, director of John R. Emens Auditorium and Pruis Hall. “Emens used to be a one-stop shop.”

Whether for organizers at Emens, Muncie Civic Theatre, Cornerstone Center for the Arts or other area venues, there are always new challenges – economic struggles, other forms of entertainment competing for attention – to attract an audience, and those facilities are working to ensure the people will continue to buy tickets in the coming years.

Emens is also having to fight increasing competition from other sites doing commercial events. Large venues such as Hoosier Park in Anderson and Klipsch Music Center in Noblesville can draw away potential ticket buyers.

“People have limited time and money, so we always need to find ways to keep them here,” Myers said.

Subscription sales at Emens, where a customer can purchase tickets for a package of shows, are down, following a national trend. Instead, the growth has been in single-event sales.

“We keep things priced below other markets, but even with that it can still be hard to reach certain parts of the local community,” said Kristi Chambers, the assistant director of marketing and communications.

Emens has strived to bring a wide variety of shows at prices that are well below anywhere else in the market. When the Blue Man Group plays in Chicago this year, tickets will range from $59 to $109, but tickets at their Emens show ranged from $25 to $55.

That effort helps bring in Muncie community members who might not have the opportunity to see these shows.

“I try to make sure their arts experience is something they can’t get otherwise. Everything from ballet, contemporary modern dance, Broadway musicals, unique orchestral groups and much more,” Myers said.

This has helped bring in bigger box office names over the past few years, including FUN, Blue Man Group, Here comes the Mummies, Macklemore and other headline acts.

It’s a trend officials want to continue.

For Myers, offering an opportunity to see the arts is a way to inspire people who might never have known different types of art. Myers grew up in the Chicago suburbs, and it was through his exposure to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra that his eyes were opened to the world of theater and performance.

“Emens has gotten the reputation of being for the upper crust, and that isn’t fair. We want to be for the community and the youth,” Chambers said.

Emens is also looking at offering different kinds of programming in future seasons, including children’s shows and educational pieces.

“You can’t throw out what you’ve been. We will remind folks that this is a college community auditorium, but that the town helped build the venue,” Chambers added.

The “Riverside Avenue Corridor” as Myers calls it, holds a majority of the arts and entertainment offerings from Ball State, including Emens, Sursa Hall, the David Owsley Museum of Art and the Charles W. Brown Planetarium.

Both Myers and Chambers said the community could take more advantage of these venues, which offer many free events and programs.

Myers works with the Muncie Arts and Culture Council, and the spirit of collaboration between some of the biggest groups in Muncie has been a boost for all.

“Seeing what the arts community is and having a tap into it, it’s been a way to combat the isolation of the university,” Myers said.

In the next year, Muncie residents will see the face of Emens change in a literal sense as they renovate the building.

Over the years, much of the technology and interior of Emens has been revamped. What the public will see over the summer will be renovations to the entrance. These will include:

• A more expansive main lobby with additional features

• Increased vestibule and indoor box office queuing area

• Convenient restrooms on the first floor

• Second-floor hospitality room and office space

On Civic’s stage

The evolving public interest in attending live theater that hurt Emens also affected Muncie Civic Theatre, which has stood on the corner of Main Street and North Jefferson Avenue since 1880.

In 2008, Civic was facing closure. Entertainment was shifting and membership was down with season subscriptions dwindling.

Much like Emens, the prime era for the theater was the 1960’s, but as the theater approaches 140 years old by the year 2020, Civic is growing in ways it never could have expected, due to a devoted staff and board of directors.

“Before we were involved, we read an article in the newspaper that the theater was going to have to close,” said Laura Williamson, Civic’s current executive director.

“I fell in love with it after the first show that we watched with the old style theater,” Williamson cited as the reason she got involved with the organization.

Williamson said it can be a constant struggle to get those who work in Muncie to take part in the cultural outlets and invest in their town. The first thing the organization had to do to regain its footing was become financially stable.

A building built in 1880 is hard to keep maintained. Heating and cooling costs are a constant struggle for a non-profit.

“We have been the keepers of this historical space in Muncie,” Williamson said.

After re-establishing its building, those involved in the theater wanted to bring “community” back to community theater.

The board of directors has transitioned from actors to a larger cross section of the community, including business owners who wanted Civic Theatre to remain open.

“We needed the right people at the right time and they started showing up,” said Chris Griffith, the business director of Civic.

“We honor the artist, but we also honor the business aspect of the theater,” Williamson said.

The programming for the theater also followed suit by starting a community theater program for kids. It has allowed the group to build up a new generation of young actors inspired by theater in the hopes they continue to spread the arts in the local community.

Civic now works with the Youth Opportunity Center, Motivate our Minds, the Boys & Girls Club and other local organizations. It also offers a barrier-free theater program, which allows performance opportunities for those with developmental or physical disabilities.

Williamson knew when she she became president she wanted the theater to focus on bringing in different sectors of the community, and that effort has seen overwhelming support from the board.

Her biggest motivation has been the motto instilled by William H. Ball who said in 1931 that the theater was “a civic organization conceived with all the sincerity and ambition with which such a name would suggest. The desire to put on a show is universal and we succumb to it wholeheartedly.”

“We look at ourselves in the greater community picture and that our mission is to support other organizations in theater. We are theater programs after school, but not an afterschool program,” Griffith said.

In the coming years, Civic will be focusing on shoring up the building so that it can stand for another century both structurally and financially. Education and connections are still going to be a huge focus of the theater moving forward, as well.

Historic landmarks

The building itself is a lead character in the story of Muncie and the arts moving forward. It’s part of the town.

“We see ourselves as stewards with this building in upholding something that needs to be preserved,” Williamson said.

Growth will continue as more organizations form connections and the community realizes what the theater has to offer.

“It’s one thing to plant the seed, but it’s another to get a whole community behind that message,” Griffith said.

Just down the street from Civic Theatre is another large building and organization dedicated to the arts in Muncie.

Cornerstone Center for the Arts, an organization dedicated to arts programming for everyone, has seen large updates in recent months to its HVAC and the addition of solar panels to its roof.

“We couldn’t use the third floor due to lack in heating and cooling, which we need as every year we’ve had more people,” said Marilyn Cleary, the executive director of Cornerstone.

The original owners of the building after the Masons left was the Muncie Center for the Arts, which would eventually develop into Cornerstone. The building itself is difficult to fund and maintain due to its sheer size. Even after overcoming some of the funding hurdles of the building, Cornerstone still has to reach out to the public as often as possible.

“They aren’t aware of the full spectrum we do,” Cleary said.

The organization offers a wide variety of classes that expand each year, including belly dance, arts classes, ball room dancing, private music lessons and more. Cornerstone’s advantage is as a non-profit, it can offer the classes a lot cheaper than for-profit entities that might do the same.

“We are trying to get more involved with the different cultures in the area,” Cleary said.

Some of this is possible because of the Muncie Arts Council, and Cleary using it to help keep a pulse on what local artists and the general public need.

“This is where MAC may play into is that we are able to get the overall awareness of what we offer,”

Cleary is a strong believer in the arts, insisting that when the community becomes more involved in the dozens of organizations around Muncie, the better-rounded the town becomes.

Moving into the future as these connections continue to form each organization will grow stronger, in turn spurring more interest in the arts.